So at 5am I woke up from a dream obsessed with an idea I thought I had gotten over.

Disneyland.

I want to go so bad. I haven’t been in a few years. I went for my friends birthday a few years ago, but we only hit a few rides.

I want to be there with my boyfriend for a few days. Something good for us. Like a mini vacation. Hit rides over and over again. I feel like it would be a good recharge. I get excited just thinking about it. I’m hoping to save up enough money so that we can go later this year, during the “off season”. I want to do the whole shebang, which I haven’t done since I was a kid, and a few things that I have never done.

I want to do the pin and the lanyard thing, exchanging the pins with the employees. I even found some pin sets for sale on Amazon. And the character breakfast. Or running around and getting the characters autographs in a book. I know I haven’t done that one since I was a kid. Just do the total experience.

There are legitimate worries and concerns. Like saving up for it and having enough money to do all of it. The tickets are super expensive. A two day park hopper pass is almost $500. 3 days is almost $600.The 3 day comes with early morning access and a character breakfast. And then figure around $100 a day for food. So we are already looking at $1000 just for doing stuff in the park. That’s not including the hotel and getting souvenirs. So maybe $1500…

I think its doable. At least saving up a huge chunk for it. Just not spending a lot of money unless we need too. Just keep saving. This is also saying that I get back to work soon. Which is up in the air. But once I get working I’ll pick up as many extra shifts as I can just to help save for it.

Hey, have you guys seen the Disney Adult Coloring books? There is Disney Animals, Disney Villians, and Disney Princesses.

Isn’t it weird how friendships fall apart? I had a best friend for years. We would tell each other everything. Then his girlfriend, whom I’ve never met, decided she didn’t like me and that he can’t talk to me. Which I just think its dumb. We did stop talking for a while and then we ran into each other at school and started talking again. But now it’s a struggle to get him to talk to me anymore. It’s like he doesn’t want me around or to be friends. It shouldn’t feel like I’m pulling teeth to talk to a friend. Right?

So I had therapy before group today. We talked about how to comfort myself when something upsetting or fearful happens. We figured out that I liked giving and reviving hugs. So we came up with a way for me to hug myself that I don’t feel like a total dork about and its not that obvious that I’m doing it. My arms are crossed in front of me and my palms rest on my biceps. And then I move one hand up and down, and then the next. I tried to tap, which was the original idea, but it didn’t seem to stay comforting like it did in the secession. Then we worked on a positive image that I can bring up anytime. Of course it involves Gucci. Hugging Gucci, using my tactile memory of the feel of his coat and mane, how warm he is, how he’d hug me back.

When he isn’t stuffing his face full of green grass, of course.

So instead of normal group today, I went to Depression Treatment Group. They meet twice a week, but I can only make the class once a week as the second class is Thursday afternoon/evening. That’d be hard to make even if I was driving myself over to Santa Clara every day. But since I’m not right now, I’m just going on Tuesday mornings. Its also a 10 class program, and I started the class in class 9. The instructors say that it is fine coming in anywhere in the program. The ‘formula’ that they use for depression is : Depression = Stress/Sadness + Powerlessness. The goal of the class is to feel empowered.

So this class session was focused on communication skills: managing competing wants and needs. The ‘big idea’ behind it is that communicating effectively is an exercise of healthy power. Depression comes with the feeling of being stuck. But by being able to say no, or communicate clearly, its meant to help you feel better and more confident. Which brings up your happiness level. We were given a list of non assertive assumptions and assertive perspective. The Assertive Perspective starts every sentence and answer with “You have the right to” and then its an emotion or a feeling that follows.

We also worked on the communication styles: Passive, Assertive, and Agressive. For each of these three types of conversations you have the belief, the strategy, and the frequent feelings. Its not always in that order. But it was interesting to see that. We also discussed the goals of communication. Objectives effectiveness: getting your objective or goals in a situation. Relationship effectiveness: Getting or keeping a good relationship. And Self-Respect effectiveness: keeping or improving self-respect and liking for yourself.